HOURS OF SHOPS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25514, 19 April 1944, Page 4

HOURS OF SHOPS

SATURDAY CLOSING PROPOSAL MANUFACTURERS DISTURBED (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Apl. 18. “If the announcement means that retail shops may close on Saturday mornings without any adequate compensation in shopping hours on other days of the week, it is a most disturbing one to manufacturers,” said Mr D. I. Macdonald, secretary of the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation, in a statement to-day. This comment was made in reference to the recent newspaper announcement that a decision to give favourable consideration to the' introduction of a five-day 43-hour week, contingent on the acceptance by the Workers’ Union of certain conditions,® was made at a council meeting of members of the New Zealand Retailers’ Federation in Wellington last week. It was stated by the federation that the decision had been made in view of the pending expiration of the retail shop assistants’ award and owing to the difficulty of trading at present, due to war-time conditions. “ One of the genuine causes of absenteeism in factories,” Mr Macdonald said, “ is that factory workers, particularly married women, who haye done a splendid j<?b of war work in hundreds of factories throughout New Zealand, are even now unable to do their family shopping without taking time off, and hence interfering with factory production. One of the cornerstones of industry is service to the community. This applies to retailers and distributive industries equally along with producers and manufacture X'S.

“ While the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation realises that it cannot, and should not, interfere in a domestic matter between the retailers and their employees, it is directly interested in ensuring that the thousands of factory workers throughout New Zealand have adequate time for shopping outside factory working hours. It is felt that, for at least the period of the war, every effort should be made to maintain the present shopping hours rather than to reduce the hburs.

“With the substantial amount of overtime and shift work in factories to-day,” Mr Macdonald concluded, “ Saturday is about the only time left for many workers to do their shopping. If Saturday morning is to be lost, however, then the shops which close should at least be required b> the Government to remain open during lunch hours and later in the evening than the present closing hours on other days of the week.”